As digital cameras have become ubiquitous, and cheap (or free) photo websites plentiful, more people than ever are using images in presentations. Images are not appropriate for every kind of talk, but even when images are appropriate (such as keynote/ballroom style presentations), people are still making the same common mistakes. So here are some things to keep in mind if you use images in your next talk. (Get Get a larger version of the "slides" image here. ) Case study: a single slide Let's imagine you are preparing a presentation for a large audience on current issues in Japanese education.

The video presentations are not perfect, but many of them may give you some ideas for changing the way you present your supporting visuals in your talks aided by slideware. My aim, as always, is not to say that you should do it exactly like these examples on GOOD, but simply to suggest that you watch a few of these and ask yourself in what ways did the visuals work, in what ways do they need improvement, what could you copy, and so on. Transparency: Drinking Water This short presentation contains no voice over at all. Recently I stumbled across GOOD Magazine, and their website www.good.is.

This is not a cast- in- concrete rule and will depend on the ’shape’ of the visual content that you add. Now that you have the assertion worked out, the next step is to add visual evidence. Expressing an idea visually as well as verbally makes it more likely that the audience will understand it and remember it. It’s called the Assertion-Evidence Format and it was developed by Professor Michael Alley (I’ve mentioned it previously but somehow never devoted a whole post to it). BTW, if you’ve downloaded and read my Presentation Planning

Inspiration from ‘Visual Blogger’ Mark Smiciklas of Intersection Marketing But the very best visuals take a complex idea or series of connected ideas and make them instantly understandable. Just the right visuals make those ideas even more memorable when they are funny as well. It’s hard to make things easy. And, it’s even harder to be amusing at the same time.

Watch the video below on Youtube. Presenting large While most of us do not have the skills or tools to create a video like this, many people can actually present live to similar visual displays that they create themselves using only off-the-shelf tools like PowerPoint or Keynote (and photo-editing software). It's all actually quite simple: Big type and large full-bleed images (and great ideas; that's the hard part). Here's yet another example of combining imagery, text, animation, and audio to make an impact in a short amount of time. This

The massive city of Tokyo is but one aspect of Japan that offers its own unique, rich tapestry of visual intrigue and inspiration. In Photoshop you can adjust Curves to obtain a similar effect with images.) Like many foreign nationals in Japan, I love living here and can't imagine living anywhere else. I

They may be cleverly planned or happen unwittingly during the production of the visual. The chart below shows a correctly scaled trend and six ways the visual image changes by expanding or contracting the grid layout. Tags: Book Reviews Design Strategy charts data grid trend truth visual imag There are few of us who, at at one time or another, have either exaggerated or shaded the truth by either bragging or playing down a story. What we say may not be an untruth, but we want to emphasize one fact to a certain party, and a different fact to another.

0160; Or they use cheap-looking clip art that creates a tacky image of speaker and organization in the mind of the audience.  Tags: Audience-Centered Speaking Public Speaking Speech Writing Visual Aid I’ve blogged many times on how NOT to use Power Point.  0160; Most people use it incorrectly, and it becomes a barrier between speaker and audience. 

All too often, when people are trying to do the right thing by creating a strong visual to represent an idea, they fall back on the literal meaning of the word.  This This often makes it very difficult to find the right image to convey the idea and will often result in a visual that seems forced. 8221;  The ideas came flowing in and they were all very left-brain type of visuals; that is very literal: Take for example, the concept of the “Open Government Initiative.” 8221;  The application in this case was a blog, but I thought to myself, “what if

Just a quick note to let you know that a new Slide Makeover Video Podcast based on the ideas in "The Visual Slide Revolution" is available for your viewing through the iTunes Store, online or through my YouTube channel. This makeover shows how to take a graph image and make it more effective using tools in PowerPoint. You can also watch all the podcasts on When we get graphs as graphics from other sources, we think there is nothing we can do with them. This slide was submitted by one of the participants in a workshop - someone just like you who is looking for a way to make their